"You'll get out of this house and stay out...." Roger's eyes were ablaze and his features worked convulsively. The other, much larger of frame, glared down at him with a gaze as hot as his own. The atmosphere was tense.
Then, almost simultaneously the curtains parted and the two sections of the piazza window swung inward. Baker who had left the two men very reluctantly, and had returned as soon as he decently could, was present at the climax. He jumped forward as he saw the two men facing each other over the narrow table, and comprehended the situation. But he was too late. He caught an ugly word from Wynrod. Then, with a savage oath, Faxon's arm shot out.
There was the dull crunch of flesh against flesh, and the younger man staggered back from the impact; then blind with rage, he sprang forward again; a crash of shattered glass followed, as the mis-aimed whisky bottle splintered against the sideboard. Then, simultaneously the three men became aware of Judith standing white and statuesque in the window, her eyes ablaze with scorn and repulsion.
Of what was said she had no clear memory afterwards. Roger, belligerent still, attempted a hot defence, but she silenced him with a cutting word. Faxon for the first time on record, found his suavity forsake him. He had been caught by his hostess in a disorderly broil, and his dapperness was marred with spattered liquor. His rhetoric quite broke down and he was conscious of making the most awkward exit of his career.
It was fully an hour later, when the house was quiet for the night, that Judith found Roger nursing a slight but smarting cut on his cheek, where Faxon's seal ring had grazed it.
"Roger," she said, "that's enough 'first aid,' isn't it? I want to talk with you."
"Oh, cut it out, Judith. Go to bed. I've had all a fellow can stand for one evening, without being lectured by you!"
"It can't wait, Roger. I have some things that I must say to you now, to-night, and you have got to listen. I couldn't sleep if I didn't. I have waited too long already. If I hadn't, this wretched, vulgar thing wouldn't have happened.... And with one of your own guests, too."
He straightened at that and lost his sheepish look. "One of my guests? Not by a million! I wouldn't have that damned bounder in my kennels. Why, hang it all, Judith, I can't see what you have the chap around for at all. He...."